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AmanO

macrumors regular
Original poster
If I run the OS off a slow PATA drive, will that affect transfer rates that much with stored files on 2 SATA drives?

Also, will I benefit enough to warrant jumping through the hoops to get Mav/Yos on there? Should I even go XP?
 
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Actually, I think my net speeds will be better than that PATA drive. Gigabit, even with overhead is 100MBPS.

GbE is 125 MB/sec raw. Even with overhead, file sharing protocols deliver 110 to 120 MB/sec on good networks.

So, yes, the PATA drive could easily be the bottleneck.
 
OK. So the "overhead" of going though the OS is minimal? I meant more of the OS handling the transfers.

Actually, I think my net speeds will be better than that PATA drive. Gigabit, even with overhead is 100MBPS.

Realistic speeds will be more in the neighborhood of 80MBps. Thats not saying that you will not ever see 100MBps just that you will not see sustained transfer speeds at 100MBps.
GbE is 125 MB/sec raw. Even with overhead, file sharing protocols deliver 110 to 120 MB/sec on good networks.

So, yes, the PATA drive could easily be the bottleneck.

Normal realistic speeds will be more in the neighborhood of 80MBps. Thats not to say that sustained transfer speeds of 100MBps are not reachable, just that they are not realistic and much harder to achieve.

The OP is storing the data on SATA drives so PATA speeds are not an concern.
 
Realistic speeds will be more in the neighborhood of 80MBps. Thats not saying that you will not ever see 100MBps just that you will not see sustained transfer speeds at 100MBps.

That's funny - one task for me this weekend has been to move about 25 TB of real data over my home network to rationalize some file server assignments.

12 hour averages over 110 MB/sec have been typical...

If I saw 80 MB/sec on network disks I'd fix the problem.

The OP is storing the data on SATA drives so PATA speeds are not an concern.

Early SATA drives weren't that much faster than PATA drives from that era,
 
That's funny - one task for me this weekend has been to move about 25 TB of real data over my home network to rationalize some file server assignments.

12 hour averages over 110 MB/sec have been typical...

If I saw 80 MB/sec on network disks I'd fix the problem.



Early SATA drives weren't that much faster than PATA drives from that era,

That last part is true, for sure, but I am using an old PATA drive. If I were so inclined and was going to use this for a long time, I may buy a PATA to SATA converter and pop an SSD in there for the OS.
I would max the bus out even with a crappy SSD.
 
There's 2 more sata ports on the logic board behind the fan. you just need a data cable and molex power adapter
 
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Your BAY drives shouldn't cause a slow down, they're SATA 3.

Use the 2 ODD SATA ports and run it up to below the DVD drive and get a molex to sata power adapter and use that as an OS drive. Get a small SSD. Maybe 256GB

The OS drive will not slow down the transfer speeds. You can easily get 110MB/sec via gigabit network and a decent switch.

Maybe run both GigE ports to the switch on the MP and assign 2 different static IP's to it so you can push double the speed when needed.
 
Your BAY drives shouldn't cause a slow down, they're SATA 3.

Use the 2 ODD SATA ports and run it up to below the DVD drive and get a molex to sata power adapter and use that as an OS drive. Get a small SSD. Maybe 256GB

The OS drive will not slow down the transfer speeds. You can easily get 110MB/sec via gigabit network and a decent switch.

Maybe run both GigE ports to the switch on the MP and assign 2 different static IP's to it so you can push double the speed when needed.

Unfortunately no built in SATA 3 in the history of Mac Pro :(
 
Yea you basically have to remove the front fan assembly. It's not too bad, just a screw or two then it slides out.

From there you can route the sata cables up into the optical bay. Using a right angled connector at the motherboard end is a requirement as mentioned. Power is from the optical bay Molex connectors, just get an adaptor.
 
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